Social Psychology Flashcards
What are the 3 themes of Social Psychology?
1) How people think about others.
2) How people influence others.
3) How people relate to others.
Attribution
Beliefs one develops to explain human behavior and characteristics, as well as situations.
Dispositional Attribution
Behavior assumed to result from traits or personality characteristics.
Situational Attribution
Behavior assumed to result from situational factors.
Fundamental Attribution Error
When judging other people’s behavior we overestimate the influence of dispositional factors and underestimate the influence of situational factors.
Self-Serving Bias
An individual’s tendency to claim credit for their success, but deny blame for their failure.
Attitude
Relatively stable thoughts, feelings, and responses toward people, situations, ideas, and things.
Cognitive Dissonance Theory
The idea that humans dislike inconsistencies between their behavior and attitude.
Ex. You are against texting and driving, but you text while driving.
What are 2 ways to reduce cognitive dissonance?
1) Change behavior
Ex. Stop texting and driving
2) Change attitude (more likely)
Ex. Convince yourself that texting and driving is not as bad as people say it is
How do attitudes and behaviors influence each other?
Attitudes can influence our behavior.
Ex. Positive attitude toward smoking –> More likely to smoke
Behaviors can also influence our attitudes.
Ex. Engaging in unexpected or unusual behavior can change our attitude toward that behavior
Describe Asch’s experiments on conformity.
A volunteer is told he is participating in a visual perception test. He doesn’t know all the other participants are actors who were told to answer incorrectly. The volunteer is monitored to see if he gives the correct answer or goes along with the opinion of the group. Eventually, he goes along with the group even if he didn’t agree.
Conformity
The tendency to modify behaviors, attitudes, beliefs, and opinions to match those of others.
Normative Social Influence
Conforming to achieve acceptance.
Informational Social Influence
Conforming to be correct.
What effect does dissent have on conformity?
Conformity is less likely if at least one person goes against the group. Additionally, dissent can elevate the quality of group decision-making.
Obedience
Changing behavior because we have been ordered to do so by an authority figure.
Describe Milgram’s experiments on obedience.
A teacher (participant) was instructed to shock a student (actor) each time he answered a question wrong. The experimenter (authority figure) demanded the teacher to increase the voltage each time and continue with the experiment. This study showed that people will obey orders given by an authority regardless of how cruel they were.
What factors increased obedience in Milgram’s experiments?
1) Perceived legitimacy of authority.
2) Psychological closeness to authority.
3) Psychological distance from victim.
Interpersonal Attraction
The factors that lead us to form friendships or romantic relationships with others.
What are the 3 principles of interpersonal attraction?
1) Proximity: We like people who are near us.
2) Similarity: We like others who are similar to us.
3) Reciprocity: We like others who like us.
Mere Exposure Effect
The more we are exposed to someone or something, the more positive our reaction to it becomes.
Stimulus Value-Role Theory
People look for compatibility in 3 stages:
1) Stimulus stage- age, appearance, and ethnicity
2) Value stage- attitudes and beliefs
3) Role stage- social roles
Stereotypes
(Beliefs) Conclusions or inferences (positive or negative) we make about people based on their group membership, such as race, religion, age, or gender.
Prejudice
(Attitude) Holding hostile or negative attitudes toward an individual or group.
